I once heard a film expert say that the birth of the ‘talkie’ was the worst thing to ever happen to cinema. When I heard that at first, I thought he was a bit crazy, but now I understand what he was getting at. Films like Sunrise show how lack of sound forced early filmmakers to innovate and rely on visuals to tell the story. The talkie virtually destroyed all progress that had been made, as filmmakers were forced to severely limit visuals just to have a bit of audio, thus compromising and usually destroying their own films. Sunrise, however, shows just how incredible visual cinema truly can be, and being one of the pioneers of cinema, it had almost nothing to look back on. Sunrise was a revolutionary piece of cinema.
I think what really stuck me about Murnau’s silent classic Sunrise is just how well it has aged after over the years. Sure, the actual film is grainy and scratched, but that’s all superficial; what I’m talking about is the content, the ‘soul’ of the movie, which even today feels fresh and undated. The story is simple enough, fairly linear, and there is not too much complexity on the exterior, but I like to think of Sunrise to be more of a fable on film than anything else, and I find many silent movies (and interestingly enough, many Italian neorealist films) share this trait. So therefore the simplicity really shouldn’t be seen as a fault, but more as a way for this fable to convey its moral message, and since Sunrise is an incredibly visual movie, the simple story also allows for the visuals to do the talking, and they literally do all the talking, being that Sunrise is a silent film.
Sunrise is indeed a sublime example of cinematography and the use of visuals to advance a story, but Sunrise is also a revolutionary example of this. I really think Sunrise was one of the pioneer films of cinema, and is virtually a textbook of visual and editing techniques. However, that’s not to say that it’s a boring manual, as it is a film that puts visuals to beautiful use and the 90 minute runtime is literally bursting at the seam with gorgeously done visuals, from lovely sunrises to deadly thunder storms - and they are all used to tell the story. Some scenes really take your breath away, such as the one in which the camera tracks across fast flowing traffic as the two lovers cross the street, almost ignorant of the danger, or the entire thunderstorm sequence. Simply by having the camera set up a certain way and skilfully utilizing light and shadow, Murnau was able to convey amazing amounts of emotion and easily advance the plot. If he wanted you to feel dread and know what a character was planning to do, he easily did so, and in the end did a wonderful job, making the movie both enjoyable to watch as well as morally relevant. As I said earlier, Sunrise has not really dated at all, and therefore is still a very entertaining as well as thought provoking film.
The two main characters are very well acted, a rare occurrence in silent films, and their chemistry is exquisite - the main girl was particularly cute, almost like a kitten! It even retains much of its humour, which is found largely in the happy midsection of the film as opposed to the dark beginning and end. Of course, Sunrise is just as good at illustrating terror and disaster, and like the humour, much of these other emotions or themes have not faded away with time either, and still feel very immediate and fresh. Thematically there is a lot going on with simple morals, such as temptation breaking love, or love breaking temptation. It is simple, as I said, fable like, and coincides extremely well with the rest of the structure of the film. It’s very interesting to see the stark differences in the main character from the beginning to end – and remember, all of this well developed with no words, just visuals!
I really love Sunrise because of how revolutionary it was, and how it has still managed to keep so much of its charm and beauty intact. The film was a flop at the box-office, and two weeks after it came out, Murnau died in a tragic car accident, but it has since proved to the world that it was obviously well ahead of its time. The use of magnificent and stirring images to illustrate the fable like story is impeccable, and the journey the characters go through is enjoyable, and easy to watch while at the same time able to become dark and cautionary. But at its center, Sunrise is always using the various arts of film to tell a story, to get across a message and to develop complex, relatable characters. That’s what’s so revolutionary and amazing about Sunrise; it’s one of the pioneering films to really understand how to take advantage of the then new visual medium which has unlimited potential. Perhaps that is why Sunrise still feels so fresh and new; it understood what it takes to make a remarkable film, and remarkable Sunrise is.
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